A tactile stimulation device includes a plurality of actuators and selectively vibrates the plurality of actuators to provide a tactile stimulus to a user. The tactile stimulation device generally generates a tactile stimulus by selecting and vibrating an actuator closest to a position where the tactile stimulus is to be generated.
However, in order to provide a more precise tactile stimulus to the user, a method for providing a virtual tactile stimulus at a midpoint using two actuators is proposed.
FIG. 1 is a view for explaining a tactile stimulation device for providing a virtual tactile stimulus in the related art. Referring to FIG. 1, the tactile stimulation device includes a plurality of actuators 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108, and 109 arranged on a substrate 11 in a substantially matrix form.
When a body 15 such as a wrist of the user or the like is in contact with the tactile stimulation device, the tactile stimulation device may provide the virtual tactile stimulus which moves over time to the user from an actuator 101 to an actuator 102 using, for example, the actuators 101 and 102.
For example, when the tactile stimulation device intends to provide the tactile stimulus to the position of the actuator 101, the tactile stimulation device vibrates the actuator 101 with a set maximum magnitude and does not vibrate or vibrates the actuator 102 with a minimum magnitude. When the tactile stimulation device intends to provide the virtual tactile stimulus to a position 110, the tactile stimulant device vibrates the actuator 101 with a relatively large magnitude and vibrates the actuator 102 with a relatively small magnitude. When the tactile stimulation device intends to provide the virtual tactile stimulus to an intermediate position 111 between the actuator 101 and the actuator 102, the tactile stimulation device vibrates the actuator 101 and the actuator 102 with the same magnitude. When the tactile stimulation device intends to provide the virtual tactile stimulus to a position 112, the tactile stimulant device vibrates the actuator 101 with the relatively small magnitude and vibrates the actuator 102 with the relatively large magnitude. When the tactile stimulation device intends to provide the tactile stimulus to the position of the actuator 102, the tactile stimulation device vibrates only the actuator 102 with the set maximum magnitude and does not vibrate or vibrates the actuator 102 with the minimum magnitude.
The tactile stimulation device can provide the user with the virtual tactile stimulus moving between the two selected actuators by changing the magnitude of the vibration of the actuator corresponding to the position depending on the time as described above.
However, the tactile stimulation device of FIG. 1 provides only the virtual tactile stimulus on a one-dimensional line connecting the two selected actuators and fails to provide the virtual tactile stimulus on a two-dimensional plane.